One Last Time
by JustAnotherMisfit13
Summary: When Calvin's daughter Katrina has monsters hiding under her bed, Calvin gives her a certain tiger to help protect her.


**So yeah, I've been kinda dead as far as FF activity goes. This is the first time I've written in a few months :P Anyway, this is based off of a picture I saw of a grown – up Calvin who gives his daughter Hobbes when there's monsters in her closet. It really hit home :) Sooo, I made this! And uh, I hope you like it! If my writing sucks, I'm sorry, I haven't written anything in a long time :P**

"Daaaaaaaadd!"

A loud holler was heard throughout the house in the darkness, and in the master bedroom, a 30-something year old father of the holleror, groaned and pulled the covers of the bed over his head. He thought if maybe he pretended he didn't hear it the noise would go away.

"Daaaaaad! There's monsters under my bed!"

No such luck as that.

"Your daughter wants you." He rolled his head over to see the brown haired figure next to him where the muffled voice came from.

"She's your daughter too."

"Unless she's yelling for me, it's not my problem." The figure responded, snuggling further into the bed. "Go on, she's not going to let up!" He felt a kick to his leg and responded with an annoyed "ow!" He sighed and sat up.

"You drive me crazy Derkins."

"You haven't been able to call me that for seven years. Thought you would've stopped that by now."

Calvin let a small smile. If someone had told his six year old self that he would marry his neighbour/sometimes friend Susie Derkins, he would've made a disgusted face and called them crazy.

He glanced over to the bedside table and looked and the alarm clock.

4:47 in the morning.

He finally understood his why parents always looked so ticked off when he called them this early.

He eventually pried himself off the bed and stuck his feet into his slippers, then proceeded down the hall to the door with the poster with the name "Katrina" in messy printing on it. Pushing it open, he found his daughter sitting on her bed, her knees up to her chest.

"What's the matter Kat?"

She whipped her head over to her father. Calvin smiled inwardly when he saw his daughter. She had her father's blonde hair, slightly messy and spiky and all over the place, but had her mother's light brown eyes.

"I heard monsters under my bed daddy! As soon as I go to sleep they're going to eat me!"

Calvin still remembered those innocent kid days when he believed the very same. His parents never did, or bothered to play along for his sake. But then again, he always had a friend to protect him from the voices below.

That's when he had an idea.

"Hold on there for a moment sweetie. I think I know the solution to your problem."

Giving his daughter a quick smile, he headed out into the hallway again. Following it to the very end, he started going up a slew of stairs to the attic. When he reached the top, he squinted through the dark of the musky small room, only light coming from the small window. Seeing the box he needed, he pulled open the lid, coughing as the dust rose up around him, and spotted what he needed.

There, sat in all his orange and black stripped glory, was his childhood best friend Hobbes.

It had been hard, the transition of saying goodbye to the only friend he knew. But somewhere deep down, past the lies (though they were not really lies at the time) that him and Hobbes would be bestfriends forever, he knew that there would be a time to let go.

It started when he finally reached 13. It was a weird time. School was changing. No more of the same class or teacher, you now moved from class to class (though he was glad to be rid of Miss Wormwood), revolting school caf lunches, and the ridiculous amounts of homework. He was changing also – his voice was getting deeper, he was growing hair in places then just atop his head, and his arms and legs had become more lanker. And not only that, but girls were also changing. They were once these gross creatures, but now they were what he would be staring at in class and in the halls. Even Suzie! She was now no longer his annoying neighbour and "lunch buddy" but now was a pretty young girl with beautiful brown eyes. At first this terrified him, and he went to his dad to get help, saying he was sure he was going crazy. But his dad only chuckled and smiled, saying that Calvin was only growing up. He even started making friends too. He started talking to a few guys in his P.E class and soon enough they were close buds, hanging out at the movie theatre or at the mall, sometimes checking out girls. Things were certainly changing, but Calvin wasn't really complaining.

Things were happing with Hobbes too. Whenever Calvin got off the bus at school and Hobbes would tackle him, Calvin was now able to fight back and hold him to the ground. This ended up in arguing and fights. They were no longer able to hold anymore G.R.O.S.S meetings anymore, for Calvin no longer thought of girls like that. This also resulted in arguments and fighting. Hobbes would stay up to wait for Santa. Calvin wouldn't. Hobbes would want to build snowmen when the weather was right. Calvin would call it stupid. Hobbes would suggest going into the time machine and seeing the dinosaurs. Calvin would say he had math homework to do, or was going out the guys. And things carried out like that for a long time.  
At one point Hobbes yelled at Calvin for changing, but Calvin just called Hobbes immature and said he had "real" friends now. That was one of the biggest fights they had. They managed to calm down and say sorry. Hobbes still promised he wouldn't go anywhere, but he was worried Calvin would. Calvin promised he would stay true to Hobbes.

But sooner or later, Hobbes ended up in the attic. Calvin wasn't sure how it even happened. But soon, Hobbes was spending his nights in a box and Calvin was the only one in the bed in his room (if Suzie hadn't snuck over that night).

Snapping back to reality, Calvin gently reached into the box and pulled him out. Hobbes was torn and tattered, multiple stitches his mother had done when Calvin came running into the house crying, saying that Hobbes had injured himself, were sewn into him. But Calvin still smiled at his old friend as he held him in front of him.

"Hey ol' buddy." He greeted, his voice coming out a lot more hoarse then he imagined.

It actually frightened Calvin a bit that Hobbes was no longer how he remembered him, but now the scruffy stuffie his parents were probably use to seeing. But no matter how Calvin was seeing him now, he knew what he had to say.

"Look, I'm really sorry for putting you in a box. I don't even know how that happened! Hope it wasn't too stuffy for you in there. Anyway, I need you to do me a favour. For old times' sake."

He could even imagine Hobbes cross his arms and raise his eyebrows, an expression saying "You're kidding me right? You put me in a box then expect me to do something for you?"

"Just hear me out ok?!" Calvin sighed. He felt slightly ridiculous talking to an inanimate object. But something urged him on to finish what he was saying. Plus it was Hobbes. It wasn't like he was talking to one of Katrina's plastic dinosaurs.

"My daughter, Katrina, well….there's monsters under her bed. She's only six, so she's obviously frightened. I just need you to stay with her tonight and protect her. Actually, it would be good if you just stuck around with her. Unfortunately, she picked up her father's bad gene of not being able to make friends. She's got a great imagination and has interesting ideas, but that always drives the kids away. I remember it always did with me. Infact we got a call yesterday about her putting dirt in another little girl's hair for making fun of her 'cause she couldn't answer the math problem on the board." Calvin actually gave off a little smile at that. When they got the phone call about it, Susie had given Katrina a hard time and sent her to her room. But later, Calvin went up and told his daughter he was proud that she stood up for herself, but just to be careful about how she did it.

"I know you two will be good friends. A lot of people say she's a bit like me, and well…if that's true I'm sure you won't have any problems."

For some reason, Calvin was expecting some sort of answer. Like Hobbes was supposed to sigh and finally give in and agree. But the stuffie's face remembered the same.

A moment of silence passed over and Calvin finally collected himself, put Hobbes under his arm and headed back down the stairs.

When he got back to his daughter's room, she still looked scared but when she spotted him coming in, she cocked her head to the side to see her father carrying a stuffed tiger, but her eyes lit up nonetheless.

"What's that?"

"His name is Hobbes." Calvin placed his old friend at the end of Katrina's bed "He's the most ferocious guy I know. He'll protect you for sure, he always did for me."

"He was yours?"

"Uh, yeah. Yeah he was. Infact we were rather close buds." Calvin smiled faintly. "But he can be your friend if you want. He makes a real good one."

Katrina continued to sit there for a moment, looking at the old tiger. For a moment Calvin thought the whole thing might've been a dud.

"Does he eat little girls?" She asked him. Her father smiled. His first reaction was to say no, but then he decided on a better idea.

"I don't think so, but why don't you ask him?" Katrina seemed taken back at this, but then pulled her covers back and crawled on her knees towards Hobbes and whispered the question in his ear. A few seconds past before smile broke out on her face.

"He says he just eats tuna." A grin grew on Calvin's face, a faint memory recalling him that Hobbes said the very same thing when they were just getting to know eachother.

Katrina then grabbed his arm and brought him down next to her on the bed, her on the right and Hobbes on the left, closest to the door. Her father then tucked them both in and kissed his daughter on the forehead.

"Sweet dreams Kitty-Kat." Katrina giggled then snuggled into Hobbes, throwing her arms around him and hugging him close to her.

Calvin started walking toward the door and began to shut it behind him, but not before looking back. He grinned at his sleeping daughter and the tiger, looking very peaceful. He softly kicked a plastic toy out of the way to close the door, but when he looked back up to close the door properly, he saw something that made his heart stop and his eyes widen.

Instead of just seeing the old, battered stuffie he just saw a minute ago and in the attic, he saw his childhood best friend. The old best friend who would tackle him when he got in through the door, stay up to see Santa with him, build snowmen with, hold G.R.O.S.S meetings with, and even go back into time with. And at that moment, he swore he saw Hobbes smile and give Calvin a thumbs up.

But as soon as Calvin took this in, he then blinked his eyes (and rubbed them just to make sure), he once again saw just a stuffie. An old and battered tiger.

He wasn't sure how to register this. Does this mean he can see Hobbes again? Calvin squinted through the dark to see, but still, Hobbes remained the same, just a stuffie in Calvin's eyes now. He started to bush his eyebrows together, but then stopped and smiled. Why bother questioning it?

So instead Calvin closed the door and started walking back to the bedroom to Susie, glad he was able to see his best friend one last time.

**Like it? Review it! :D **


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